We describe models of preventive and therapeutic vaccination of sarcoma-bearing rats with dendritic cells (DC) presenting tumour antigens from killed tumour cells, together with characteristics of DC-based vaccine and its capacity to induce anti-tumour immune response both in vitro and in vivo. We show that preventive vaccination efficiently prevents tumour growth. However, vaccination of rats with established tumours did not lead to eradication of the tumours – despite induction of a vigorous immune response and transient decrease in tumour progression, tumours eventually resumed growth. Preventive and therapeutic DC-based vaccination induced strong tumour-specific T-cell response. These results argue for the timing of cancer immunotherapy to the stages of low tumour load. Immunotherapy at the stage of minimal residual disease, after reduction of tumour load by other modalities, should offer a better clinical benefit to cancer patients than immunotherapy of metastatic disease.Trvalý link: http://hdl.handle.net/11104/0178670